How to raise agtech funding in 2026

Hey, Hannatu here 👋

2025 was a reality check.

African Agtechs raised $169.45 million across 87 deals. Respectable, but the bar is higher now. Much higher.

If you're raising capital in 2026, you're not just competing against other startups. You're competing against a new investor mindset. One that prioritizes both physical and digital resilience over pure software.

We spoke to the people defining this new bar. 

We gathered insights from Melanie Keita at Melanin Kapital, Eugene Gikonyo at Mercy Corps Ventures, Caspar Olenhusen at SAIS, Mukami Wainaina at Novastar Ventures, and Reginald Seleu at Sahel Capital.

Think of this as your fundraising playbook, written by the people who sign the term sheets.

Eugene Gikonyo, Principal at Mercy Corps Ventures, wants founders "in the trenches." 

A good product is not enough. You must understand small stakeholder habits. 

This includes farmers and cooperative leads. 

Know why they buy. Know why they trust a tool. Without this, they will not use it.

Reginald Seleu at Sahel Capital takes this a step further. It’s not just about usage; it’s about the wallet. "Be clear on who pays, why they pay, and how the business makes money at scale," he says.

"Go beyond assessing willingness to pay," Gikonyo explains. "Align business models with on-the-ground realities." 

Caspar Olenhusen, an Advisor at Scaling Digital Agriculture Innovations through Start-ups (SAIS) agrees completely. 

He wants teams that stay close to customers. 

According to him, this helps them iterate quickly, learn fast, quality solutions, not theories.

Mukami Wainaina, Associate Director at Novastar Ventures, believes that African agriculture is physical. 

Logistics, storage, inputs, outputs: all need ground presence.

"Businesses that combine digital tools with operations outperform," says Wainaina. 

According to her, tech is often the enabler, not the solution. So startups that own the transaction layer scale faster. 

Gikonyo supports this point. 

He emphasizes that startups need to go beyond apps. They need to leverage existing rural distribution networks. 

This accelerates reach and reduces last-mile challenges. Solutions become both scalable and accessible.

Sahel Capital also agrees. They are hunting for platforms that integrate offtake, logistics, and payments. Why? Because these sit close to the cash flow.

As Seleu notes, these platforms address the biggest structural challenge: "turning production into predictable income."

Here's what most founders miss: resilience matters more than growth speed.

Wainaina is emphatic about this. According to her, your startup must show operational discipline and adaptability. 

Your business must be climate smart. It must manage cost pressures. It must survive supply-chain volatility.

"Resilient companies are built for these realities," she explains.

Melanie Keita, co-founder and CEO at Melanin Kapital, and Gikonyo also believe startups must prove climate adaptability. 

In 2026, Gikonyo believes that saying "AI credit scoring" won't work. 

Investors are distinguishing truly AI-native companies now.

"Blanket statements face greater scrutiny," says Gikonyo. 

Investors dig deeper. They want to understand the actual benefits. Does your AI fix a specific problem? Does it predict pests or yields?

Olenhusen wants actionable AI-driven services, not buzzword algorithms in an “AI costume.”

A prediction or insight is worthless if the farmer can’t act on it. If your model flags disease or hail risk, then there should be affordable treatment. If there’s no vet, no input, no financing: you’ve created information, not impact.

Keita puts it bluntly, too. Prove you're not just using OpenAI's API. Show how your AI fundamentally changes outcomes. Show the data proving it works.

Olenhusen's advice is about power and fit. Fundraising isn't just finding money. It is choosing a long-term partner. So founders should run diligence both ways.

Ask hard questions and do proper background checks. Speak to founders in their portfolio. Learn how they support companies, and how they behave when things get messy.

Watch the signals in real time. Who owns the relationship, how fast they respond, how they communicate, and whether their capital, geography, and decision-making style actually match what you need.

At the same time, treat the raise like a structured sprint inside a longer investor-relations process.

Run outreach in parallel to build momentum. Set a clear start and end date. Ttrack simple metrics. Protect your runway so you do not negotiate from panic.

That discipline matters. As fellow investor Seleu adds, execution beats polish. Strong delivery, even at modest scale, is more convincing than ambitious projections without proof.

Agtech in 2026 is an efficiency play. Stop trying to "disrupt." Start trying to "remove friction."

Wainaina is clear: focus on efficiency and monetization. Reduce leakage. Improve performance. Monetize through high-volume transactions.

Your business must also make money fast. Venture capital patience is disappearing. Profitability isn't optional anymore.

Here are the models and sectors investors are excited about in 2026:

1. Eco-Friendly Farming

Africa currently faces some of the highest fertilizer prices globally. This comes coupled with soil degradation from years of use.

Investors are betting on natural fertilizers and pesticides that are produced here. These will be cheaper for farmers. It will also be more sustainable.

2. Asset-Light Scaling

Gikonyo is high on "tolling models" or co-manufacturing. 

This basically allows a startup to use factories or assets for a fee instead of buying them. This is VC-friendly because you aren't sinking all your cash.

3. Farmer Financing & Data

Olenhusen is particularly excited about informal market financing. 

These include the models using cooperatives and farmer clusters. He believes there is a lot of opportunity for startups that can build better credit scoring systems through data.

4. Better Input Quality

Keita emphasizes genetics, feeds, vaccines, and animal health. 

"We have a productivity issue," she explains. 

Africa doesn't produce enough for its population. She’s excited about innovations that improve the quality of crops and animals. 

2025 gave us the data: $169.45 million raised, 87 deals, and a sector that has officially stopped sliding and started climbing.

But 2026 is where we can scale even higher.

As I’ve tracked this "reality show" of African Agtech, one thing is clear: the gap between "potential" and "profit" is closing fast.

If you want to know how to bridge that gap, you need to be in the room with the people writing the checks.

That’s why next Thursday, at 12 PM EAT, I’ll be asking Melanie Keita and Reginald Seleu live questions on how agtechs can fund their operations this year and beyond.

We’re sitting down to discuss:

If you have questions, you should join us too.

👉🏾 Register here.

See you there,